Thornton tallies twice as Sharks claim sixth straight win

SAN JOSE, California (Ticker) -- The San Jose Sharks returned
from a season-long eight-game road trip and wasted no time
picking up a relatively rare home win.

Joe Thornton scored a pair of goals to lead the Sharks to a 6-4
victory over the Montreal Canadiens on Monday night.

Patrick Marleau also scored for the Sharks, who have won six
straight but improved to just 15-13-5 at home. San Jose is
22-8-3 record on the road.

"Usually when you come off the road like we have for seventeen
days there's a little bit of a letdown but (Marleau) started us
off with a great individual effort and it rolled off from that,"
Thornton said.

"Just an excellent game, it went back and forth all night but
obviously we pulled out the two points. They're the best in the
East right now and hopefully we'll be the best in the West come
shortly."

Tomas Plekanec scored two goals and defenseman Ryan O'Byrne
notched his first career NHL tally for the Canadiens.

"It was pretty nice to get the first one out of the way,"
O'Byrne said. "I didn't score a goal (in the minors) in
Hamilton until the playoffs but it would've been nice to get the
win too but that's how it goes. It was kind of back and forth
and a few mistakes out there. Not our cleanest play, we'll
simplify for Thursday in Phoenix."

Goaltender Carey Price lost for the first time in four games
since taking over for Cristobal Huet, who was traded to the
Washington Capitals last week.

"We gave up six goals so I think there's a few he'd like to have
back but that's where we're at," Montreal coach Guy Carbonneau
said. "We're playing well but we still have a young team that's
learning to play in those occasions."

After an exciting opening frame, the Sharks took advantage of a
5-on-3 power play to forge a brief one-goal lead in the second
period.

Thornton nearly scored off the faceoff but Price made the save.
However, with the puck still resting at the goal line, the
Sharks crashed the net, gained possession and sent the puck
around the boards and back to Thornton, who fired a one-timer
through Price's pads to give San Jose a 3-2 lead.

"When you get a couple of quick goals, there's a buzz in the
building and then our team picked up on it," Sharks coach Ron
Wilson said.

"Both teams had an incredible amount of energy which might have
led to some of the goals because it was kind of sloppy out
there. There were a lot of mental mistakes by both teams that
allowed goals to be scored but people were opportunistic and it
made for a fun game."

The Sharks couldn't hold down Montreal's potent offense for long
and Plekanec evened the score nearly 10 minutes later.

Plekanec received a centering feed at the slot and fired a snap
shot past Evgeni Nabokov, tying the score at 3-3 with 5:05 left
in the second period.

The offense did not stop there as Sharks enforcer Jody Shelley
got a rare goal simply trying to dump the puck down the ice.

The puck deflected off the stick of Montreal defenseman Mike
Komisarek and hit the top of the net just under the crossbar,
clearly crossing the goal line to put the Sharks up, 4-3, at
16:36 of the second period.

"I've been working on that shot for awhile, so it finally worked
out," joked Shelley, who scored his first goal since February
25, 2007, a span of 61 games. "I'll just throw it at the net
and I'll take it."

Jonathan Cheechoo extended the Sharks' lead to 5-3 in the third
period, skating right past former teammate Josh Gorges and
backhanding a shot over Price for his 20th goal. It was the
Moose Factory, Ontario native's 15th goal in his last 22 games.

"They go to the net hard, they do a good job of that and got
rewarded for it, you've got to give them credit, they work
hard," Price said. "They did go to the net and I'm sure they
were told to do that. That's how you score goals in this
league."

But again the Canadiens narrowed the deficit when Mark Streit
came down the right wing and fired a shot near the crease. Maxim
Lapierre got the rebound and backhanded it behind Nabokov to
cut the lead to 5-4.

However, defenseman Brian Campbell sealed the victory on the
power play at 18:21 of the third period after Andrei Markov was
whistled for tripping. The goal was Campbell's sixth of the
season and first since February 21.

"Obviously its nice to score but the win is really nice,"
Campbell said. "We've got to keep rolling here. We've got some
games in hand and we've really got to take care of those."